Reinhard, I can see where you are coming from, but this thread was started by DCN, who IMHO to some extent enjoys "Diplomatic privilege". Now as long as he doesn't bring Basil Fawlty into it, I think he might just have got away with it...........

Frank Williams, the actor who played the Vicar...
If you want a motorsport connection, the exterior scenes were shot mainly at "STANTA" - the Stanford Training Area of the British Army. Between Christmas 1985 and New Year 1986 (the exact day escapes me) a stage rally was run there. It was about -10C all day. The roads (that feature in "Dad's Army") were really far too fast and it was not used again. Flat in top on sheet ice, slight kink, wheel tracks leading off in the snow about a hundred yards towards the tree line... You get the picture. Stage finish braking areas got polished and the marshalls had to hide well off the road to keep safe from each car. At one finish control, the only person able to walk to the cars was a female marshall who had happened to have a pair of stiletto shoes in the car - cold but effective as ice studs...

One of the best characteristics of TNF is, to me, its participants' breadth of interest amd enthusiasm beyond the core subject. Nostalgia embraces so much, and TNF has always seemed to embrace good guys in all kinds of activities. I just felt that Clive Dunn and the illustriously British character he played so impeccably embodied for many of us a genuinely 'good guy' whose passing deserved mention - and tribute. If it's a waste of Haymarket's electrons I am confident this thread could be erased at a key stroke...

Oh yes, 'The Fast Lady' herself - the 3-litre chassised Bentley with 4 1/2-litre engine - is owned by a friend of mine down the road here to the west. A couple of miles to the south lies Frensham Great Pond into which the Bentley rolled while the movie was being shot there. We do, therefore, have a tenuous link...

One of the best characteristics of TNF is, to me, its participants' breadth of interest amd enthusiasm beyond the core subject. Nostalgia embraces so much, and TNF has always seemed to embrace good guys in all kinds of activities. I just felt that Clive Dunn and the illustriously British character he played so impeccably embodied for many of us a genuinely 'good guy' whose passing deserved mention - and tribute. If it's a waste of Haymarket's electrons I am confident this thread could be erased at a key stroke...

Oh yes, 'The Fast Lady' herself - the 3-litre chassised Bentley with 4 1/2-litre engine - is owned by a friend of mine down the road here to the west. A couple of miles to the south lies Frensham Great Pond into which the Bentley rolled while the movie was being shot there. We do, therefore, have a tenuous link...

DCN

" I am confident this thread could be erased at a key stroke..."

Just like the much-missed "Blood Pressure" thread?

How may threads/comments have been censored here?

Censorship is illegal in the UK, which a certain forum administrator would be well-advised to note.

One of the best characteristics of TNF is, to me, its participants' breadth of interest amd enthusiasm beyond the core subject. Nostalgia embraces so much, and TNF has always seemed to embrace good guys in all kinds of activities. I just felt that Clive Dunn and the illustriously British character he played so impeccably embodied for many of us a genuinely 'good guy' whose passing deserved mention - and tribute. If it's a waste of Haymarket's electrons I am confident this thread could be erased at a key stroke...

Oh yes, 'The Fast Lady' herself - the 3-litre chassised Bentley with 4 1/2-litre engine - is owned by a friend of mine down the road here to the west. A couple of miles to the south lies Frensham Great Pond into which the Bentley rolled while the movie was being shot there. We do, therefore, have a tenuous link...

DCN

Doug, I think there was only the one member who questioned your thread. The majority has it, I think.

In my former professional life (I was in the British Foreign Office) I think I would have avoided this sort of questioning of relevance of a thread by a preamble such as "Does anybody know whether Clive Dunn had any connection with motor sport?" then moving on to the message.

Over the past couple of years I have found this forum fascinating and informative but lacked the time to contribute. I am not interested in everything posted in whch case I simply move on to another topic. I do hope that members will continue to post anything they think others might find informative or simply enjoy.

But it has nothing to do with motor racing."The Fast Lady" doesn't count.

Well with all due respect, the "Fast Lady" in question is a 1927 Bentley Four and a half litre engined Red Label Speed Model, painted in British Racing Green. I recall it is sold to Stanley Baxter as an "Ex Le Mans car". Tentative I know, but we're British!!

A friend of mine has just told me, and he's a member of the "Dad's Army Appreciation Society" (honestly, and the one for "Only Fools and Horses"!!), that Brooklands was mentioned in one script, so I'm sticking with it!

I read somewhere, that when Clive joined the cast, he was one of the youngest actors in it!

A friend of mine has just told me, and he's a member of the "Dad's Army Appreciation Society" (honestly, and the one for "Only Fools and Horses"!!), that Brooklands was mentioned in one script, so I'm sticking with it!

I read somewhere, that when Clive joined the cast, he was one of the youngest actors in it!

Of the main cast, he was third youngest (48) after Ian Lavender (22) and James Beck (38). Arthur Lowe was 53, only one year older than me!

Then it was John Le Mesurier (56), John Laurie (71) and Arnold Ridley (72). Laurie and Ridley were old enough to be Dunn's father.

And there is indeed another motor-racing connection.......just before WW2 Dunn joined the Volunteer Ambulance Service based at the Seven Stars Garage on the Goldhawk Road, close to (?) the Seven Stars pub whose back alley became a hotbed of motor-racing activity in the 1960s including home to the Scirrocco-Powell F1 team.

Of the main cast, he was third youngest (48) after Ian Lavender (22) and James Beck (38). Arthur Lowe was 53, only one year older than me!

And, if I'm not mistaken, one of Clive Dunn's earlier TV roles was as a caretaker "Old Johnson" in a comedy set in a gentleman's club "Bootsie & Snudge" with Alfie Bass and Bill Fraser. A spin-off series from the earlier "The Army Game" I believe.

And, if I'm not mistaken, one of Clive Dunn's earlier TV roles was as a caretaker "Old Johnson" in a comedy set in a gentleman's club "Bootsie & Snudge" with Alfie Bass and Bill Fraser. A spin-off series from the earlier "The Army Game" I believe.

Quite right, 10 years before Dad's Army. Bill Fraser also appear in "the Fast Lady".

I always liked that Croft and Perry would sometimes give the characters a little bit of grit in their personalities - Mainwaring facing down some German soldiers with an empty gun, Godfrey crawling through a mined beach to help a colleague, Fraser threatening an MP with a past discretion in order to save Godfrey's cottage, and so on.

I always liked that Croft and Perry would sometimes give the characters a little bit of grit in their personalities - Mainwaring facing down some German soldiers with an empty gun, Godfrey crawling through a mined beach to help a colleague, Fraser threatening an MP with a past discretion in order to save Godfrey's cottage, and so on.

Absolutely - there was always that unspoken suggestion that they were a little bit more competent than they seemed. Godfrey with his WW1 gong (I think he was a conscientious objector but served as a stretcher bearer, under fire in no-man's land). And Fraser was a crack shot in between his constant moaning, the result of being the local poacher, and the late lamented L.Cpl. Jones you just knew couldn't wait for some sort of action, preferably with bayonet attached.

I recall that the series "Allo Allo" was a hit with German viewers when it was screened there, presumably with sub-titles. I wonder what they would have made of "Dad's Army"?

I recall that the series "Allo Allo" was a hit with German viewers when it was screened there, presumably with sub-titles. I wonder what they would have made of "Dad's Army"?

Almost unbelievably, 'Allo 'Allo' was sold to the French, no idea how well it went down there. I love France and have always found the locals very friendly, but I don't think they're a nation famed for laughing at themselves. I remember many years ago being in a hotel in Heidelberg. There was a TV on in the bar, and showing was 'On the Buses' dubbed into German, complete with fake laughter, but the laughter, which all the watching Germans joined in, seemed to us to be in all the wrong places. Wife & I fell about when Reg Varney came out with a solemn "Wie gehts meine Kameradin" to a couple of clippies, whereupon the locals all looked at us strangely.

and a few of us Aussies,its still on prime time TV here,i watched it last night,the one where the yanks come to town.

It's having a long run on Saturday evenings in the UK at the moment. In marked contrast to most other 70s sit-coms, it just seems to get better with each passing year. It doesn't matter that I've heard every gag before; I just delight in the delivery.

That it had a nostalgic theme when it was created helps stop it from dating, I guess, and now there's a double-nostalgia element, as it was something I watched as a kid. But now I'm older, I relish qualities apart from the comedy, in moments such as the one nicanary quoted earlier.